Free The Secret of the Martian Moons by Donald A. Wollheim Page A

in their seats as the little boat accelerated steadily. Nelson was determined to make the astronomically short trip in less than two hours. He piled on speed and boosted the craft up heavily, then let it coast for about half an hour at over twenty thousand miles an hour top speed. While they coasted, Jim and he speculated on the Martians.
    Nelson mentioned again the strange three-fingered handprint that he had found on the Congreve.
    Worden remarked, “I'm inclined to think now that these creatures were not the Martians. Your suggestion before sounds a little more likely now.”
    "Why do you say that?” asked Nelson, his eyes watching the steadily growing disk of Deimos, outlined against the star-strewn black of space.
    "Because I’ve figured out that the Martians must have had much the same kind of hand we have. I’ve studied their things, their machinery, their household stuff. It has always seemed to me that their handles and controls were designed to fit a hand like our own and not anything very different. Of course, I could be mistaken, but in things like this, the mechanics of everyday living can be a pretty reliable guide.” Nelson nodded briefly, switched on the engines and began his braking maneuvers. Again they were shoved into their seats, and conversation died as they fought to bring the craft into landing adjustment.
    Nelson was too busy at the controls to pay much attention to outside things, but Jim Worden was watching space. He was staring at a group of bright stars when suddenly one of them blinked out. He stared wide-eyed, then another next to it blinked off and the first came into sight. “Hey!” he said.
    Nelson looked up. “What?” 
    Worden stared sharply. He could see nothing more. “Sorry, thought I saw something just then.” He explained what he’d seen. “Thought maybe it could have been another ship between us and that sector of the sky.”
    “Probably just a meteor,” said Nelson.
    Now they were rapidly approaching Deimos. The little moon, like its sister, was quite spherical and fairly smooth-surfaced. They winged around it a couple of times to brake their speed exactly, and then Nelson brought the ship down and skimmed the surface. It was apparent that Deimos also showed but one hemisphere to Mars; a curious circumstance was Nelson’s fleeting thought, as he jockeyed to find a good spot for their observations.
    Finally, he came down for his landing on a wide flat belt, shining ruddy in the daytime glow of Mars. They slid neatly to a perfect stop on a hard and smooth surface.
    “Good work,” said Jim glancing at the control dials. “Telders couldn’t have done it better. Now let’s get the junk out.”
    Adjusting their suits to space, they slid open the boat’s top and climbed carefully out. Outside of the fact that the horizon was even nearer their feet than before, this little world was not very different from the barren satellite they had left. Above them the globe of the red planet was visibly smaller but still quite large enough to see details with the naked eye.
    Without wasting words, they unstrapped the framework of their telescope. Then they looked around. “This isn’t as good a landing place as we thought,” said Nelson, now that he could see his whereabouts better. “You might have told me I was coming in on a slant.”
    “Didn’t want to upset you,” said Jim. “Fact is I was hoping I wouldn’t get another jolt.”
    Mars was not properly in the center of their sky, but down at one side. “I think we’ll just carry the frame and lens over about three miles and we’ll get a better view,” said Nelson. Suiting action to words, he hefted the framework and apparatus, and Worden loaded himself with other stuff. Then they started off in easy long bounds.
    In only a short time they had covered the space, so easy is it to travel without weight. The boat had fallen out of sight beneath the horizon after the first two